I'm totally blown away by this. I'm a newbie in my first season, and I wrongly assumed that AAA guys were all $200,000 players. No wonder my opponents are playing them so often! Why build in such a random variable in OLs? I also wrongly assumed that the ratings were relative to other 'scrubs'. Wouldnt this be more sporting and challenging? Turns out that the guys I left down in AAA most of the season are actually better than some of my bench players. Guess it's even more of a miracle that I've got a winning record and sitting in first place by 10 games with 27 to play. But thanks for the info -- incredibly helpful for building my next team.

hersheybear you are not the only one so don't kick yourself for not realizing this. I was here for more than a month with really horrible losing teams. I assumed that the AAA were thrown in as a sort of gimmick - giving owners someone to trade for the fun of it, or whatever. When I realized that these were real players and often good ones, I felt exactly as you do now.

I suspect this is a common, almost universal experience on the SIM. A friend here at about this point in my experience told me there is a learning curve and to be patient as you learn to build winning teams. I haven't won a championship, though I have had a number of teams make it to the LCS and more in the playoffs and one lose a World Series. So you get there.

No better advice can be given than to read the forums. See also elbirdo and contrarian23's posts about pitching and about understanding fatigue. Just for starters.

Posted by hersheybear on 9/6/2012 9:49:00 PM (view original):I'm totally blown away by this. I'm a newbie in my first season, and I wrongly assumed that AAA guys were all $200,000 players. No wonder my opponents are playing them so often! Why build in such a random variable in OLs? I also wrongly assumed that the ratings were relative to other 'scrubs'. Wouldnt this be more sporting and challenging? Turns out that the guys I left down in AAA most of the season are actually better than some of my bench players. Guess it's even more of a miracle that I've got a winning record and sitting in first place by 10 games with 27 to play. But thanks for the info -- incredibly helpful for building my next team.

Always identify who your AAA players are at the start of the season to see what their abilities are, especially on defense because they sometimes have secondary fielding ratings which are a lot better than their listed position.